#Earthschooling365: Day Thirty-Eight
Inner Work Meditation (Heart): Since I am walking every day on the trail the deer have started to recognize me. They are less likely to run away and have started to stare at me in with curiosity. There is something familiar about me and yet they are unsure that I am safe to get to close to. But we have made progress in our relationship. Without words. Take some time today to think about how this is also important in our relationship with others. We often think we need to “talk it out” or explain things or “figure things out” but sometimes we can make significant progress in a relationship simply by being there near the other person on a regular basis. This subtle and gentle familiarity results in a more trusting relationship. What relationships do you have that are like that and what relationships do you have that might benefit from this?
Nature Walk Idea (Head): Today before our nature walk we will talk a bit about wildlife habituation. In today’s world where humans and wildlife live side-by-side it is especially important to respect the area wildlife does have. In the photo I took today you can see how this deer has become a little more comfortable with me. In fact, I know, that if I were to continue walking by her each day and offer her a carrot she would eventually become my friend.
However, habituation of wildlife is not a good thing for the animals so I don’t do this and I don’t plan on getting any closer than I was in this photo. It is fun to have a relationship with an animal. I love going to the petting zoo and feeding the llamas grain. I love to sit and pet my dog. And I would love to have a deer friend. But out of respect for their livelihood I make sure that I help them keep their important sense of caution around humans. Not all humans are kind or welcoming to wildlife near their homes. If you habituate an animal they will be unsafe in the wild after that and they could get hurt by someone else. This is also why it is not healthy for an animal that has been kept in captivity to be “let go”. Be sure to do your part by admiring your nature friends from afar. Form a relationship with them from a distance and allow them to live their lives in nature in the way nature intended. They have been taught by their parents to be wild and to survive in an Urban Wildlife environment.
Being a responsible nature conservationist means that you need to be careful not to re-educate the animals and teach them to be tame.
Are you interested in becoming more involved with wildlife and educating others about it? Take a look at our Wildlife Educator’s Course.
Photography Notes (Hands): Today we will move on to talk about ISO. We will come back to shutter speed later but for now we at least we understand some basics about shutter speed. ISO is one of the three pillars of photography. Shutter speed, which we already discussed a bit, is another and aperture is the third.
Today’s assignment is to shoot all your photos at ISO 100 for half of your walk and then shoot the rest of your photos at ISO 800 for the rest of your walk. You will then take these photos home and notice the differences in grain between them.
ISO is a bit like the canvas you are painting on. It determines the texture and grain of your final image and it also determines how light your final image is. In the original film cameras ISO was how sensitive the film you put into the camera was to light. In modern digital cameras ISO describes how sensitive the sensor in the camera is to light.
If you have a very sensitive sensor you will be able to take very high quality photos in very low light. And, of course, since the sensor is controlled by a computer now, you can adjust the sensitivity of the sensor by adjusting settings on your camera. So if you start with a very good sensor your range of options is larger. However, the better the sensor the more expensive the camera. In fact the sensor is the most expensive part of most camera bodies.
The three things you want to learn about ISO today are these:
- A higher ISO is equal to a higher sensitivity to light. So if you are shooting at ISO100 or ISO200 this is suitable for daylight. However, if you want to shoot indoors without a flash you will need ISO400 or ISO800.
- A higher ISO on any given camera will always lower the quality of the resulting image and add more “grain” or “noise” to the resulting photo.
- The issue that I mentioned in number two can be overcome by purchasing a more expensive camera or by trying to always shoot photos at ISO200 or below. For example, in the old film cameras “noise” was very obvious once you switched to ISO400 film. In today’s “point and shoot” cameras like the Nikon PS series cameras you can start to see “noise” at ISO800. In a more expensive camera like the Canon EOS5Ti you won’t see a lot of noise until ISO3200. In an even more advanced camera like the Canon EOS80D you will start to see noise at about ISO6400.
Number three is an important point for anyone who has been interested in photography. For in the old cameras it was mostly the lens that would be the ultimate factor in the quality of your photos. The camera body was also important, but you could easily have a cheap camera body with a great lens and still get great photos. This is because the ISO factor only came in when you put film into the camera and all cameras used the same film.
Today this is not true because some camera bodies have better “film” (computers and sensors) than other cameras do. When I was shopping for a new camera this is something I did not find explained well anywhere. A lot of technical talk was used for each camera. However, for some reason, this simple explanation of the difference between camera bodies has not been made very often. This could be because many people writing about the new digital cameras never had a manual camera in their hands.
Verse: Transfixed
Copyright Kristie Burns
You are
Wild – I am tame
You don’t yet know my name
Our eyes meet across the meadow
We pause
You jump when you see your shadow
Bounding off, tail flicked
I am transfixed
I blink
**Butterfly Cinquain: A 9-line syllabic verse of the pattern 2 / 4 / 6 / 8 / 2 / 8 / 6 / 4 / 2
*These poems have been created for many purposes – from early childhood circle time verses to inspirational or expressive. They vary from day to day so you may find the way you use them or enjoy them also varies. If you would like to set these poems to music consider our tutorial: Creating Your Ow Waldorf Verses or Finding Your Inner Voice.
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What is #Earthschooling365?
This series takes you through an entire year of our nature walks and is part of our non-profit project #Earthschooling365 at www.Earthschooling.org. The photos and posts in this series are all copyrighted. Please do not share or re-print them. Instead, share the link to this blog with your friends.
Along the way I will be sharing our favorite photo of the day, an inner work meditation for the day, photography assignment/tip for the day, nature walk theme for the day and a short verse for circle time (children) or meditation (teens/adults). We invite you to “walk along with us” this year, take some time to use the inner work meditation, be inspired by the nature walk theme of the day and perhaps even start a photo series of your own. To join the community on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram please tag your photos #Earthschooling365. To receive these inspirations in your e-mail inbox daily please subscribe to our blog alerts HERE. Don’t worry about missing days – you can join us as many days as you want this year!
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